Imran’s speech at Kartarpur: Anyone else making such statement would have been declared traitor, says Fazl

PESHAWAR JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman Thursday came hard on the speech of Prime Minister Imran Khan during the ground-breaking of Kartarpur corridor, saying that anyone else with such a speech would have been called a traitor. Fazl said the country was passing through the most delicate period of its history and all the political forces and common people should join hands to work out the future line of action.

Addressing a Tahaffuz Huqooq-e-Qabail Conference here, he said that certain elements were bent upon doing away with the freedom of the country. "Any such bid would be strongly resisted and no one would be allowed to change the independent status of the country," he declared.

Fazlur Rehman opined that the rulers were not allowed to make free decisions and the politics, economy and judiciary were under severe foreign pressure. He claimed that most decisions at every level were being taken on the dictations of foreign countries.

"Even the Supreme Court decision to acquit the blasphemy convict Aasia Bibi was taken under foreign pressure," he alleged. He added that the Supreme Court overruled the sessions' court and high court decisions and also the investigations done in the case.

"How could the Supreme Court find out in just one hearing that the investigations and court decisions were wrong," he argued, adding, the chief justice was not tiring of conducting raids on hospitals, markets and streets.

"In this most sensitive case, the chief justice should have visited the area where the blasphemy had been committed," he stressed. The JUI-F head said the same Supreme Court had said in the verdict of Mumtaz Qadri that reference from Quran and Sunnah should not be given. "But in the case of Aasia Bibi, Quran and Sunnah were referred to," he pointed out. He added that the Supreme Court issued the verdict of Aasia Bibi acquittal in Urdu so that the common man could understand it. He stressed that the court should also issue Urdu translations of the sessions and high court decisions in the same case so that the matter could be properly explained to the people.

The JUI-F chief said the execution of Mumtaz Qadri and acquittal of Aasia Bibi were aimed at appeasing the West. He said the Jews were celebrating the acquittal of Aasia Bibi. "I had predicted about this situation several years ago, but nobody was ready to accept what I was saying," he maintained.

He said that they had not learnt the lesson from their predecessors of accepting fake elections, fake prime minister and fake parliament. He criticised the prime minister for his speech at the opening of Kartarpur corridor. Had a similar speech been made by Nawaz Sharif or anyone else, he would have been declared a traitor long ago, he added.

The JUI-F chief said the Kashmir issue had been put on the backburner as India had flatly refused to resume talks with Pakistan even after opening of Kartarpur corridor. He said the border with Afghanistan has been sealed, but more border crossings with India were being opened.

The conference where the JUI-F chief spoke was organised to mobilise the people of the erstwhile Fata for seeking their rights. The JUI-F, it may be recalled, opposed the merger of Fata with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It has yet to reconcile with the merger, which took place in May 2018.